


How To Win

by shootingdaggers



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Albanian Wizard Monks, Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Canon Elements, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 11:29:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18548869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shootingdaggers/pseuds/shootingdaggers
Summary: When a chance meeting in the middle of the Albanian wilderness ignites an unexpected battle of wills, Tom realises his future may have been incredibly different.





	How To Win

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Dream On by Aerosmith  
> This piece was part of the Sing Me A Rare Volume 3 Spring/Summer 2019. I had a choice of song and I could chose Tom Riddle as my first option for pairing, Moaning Myrtle was offered by admins. All characters, spells, magical equipment and locations from the Harry Potter series belong to JK Rowling.

**Every time I look in the mirror**

**All these lines on my face getting clearer**

**The past is gone**

**It went by like dusk to dawn**

Tom’s body aches. He’s only twenty-two, but his bones cry for warmth and his muscles seize. It already feels like a lifetime has passed in this cave. Pelting rain echoes from the entrance. He caught his breath hours ago, and has done nothing but stare into the darkness since. It’s no longer exhaustion keeping him in this dark abyss -- it’s the iron grip around his heart, quashing the panic ready to overtake him. He traces the abstract letters on the book in his hands, the red-stained edges rubbing flakes on his fingers. Whoever last owned this text either died or killed for it. Fitting, for a servant of a death god. The unfamiliar sliver of doubt creeps unwelcome into his mind. Everything he needs rests within the pages, waiting to be read and repeated easy as a nursery rhyme. Yet something makes him stall.

_What if I can’t do it?_

He clenches his jaw. There’s nothing he can’t do. No magic he can’t master, no depths he won’t explore. But to meddle with time? Misjudge the balance and his path could change irrevocably; all the secrets he’s taken from the unwilling, all the knowledge he’s built. It could fold on the beat of a second.

Time isn’t something he’s ever coveted: it’s irrelevant, easily manipulated and bent to someone’s will. Not like death. Death can’t be unmade. It rushes towards him faster than ever, beating wings snatching at his ankles, the familiar whisper of ‘ _You can’t escape me_ ’ scratching at the back of his consciousness.

Only now its shapeless voice sounds like _her_.

She’s the reason he’s stuck here, freezing to death. She’s the reason he’s wasted months of his life in the desolate landscape of endless mountains and forests, with nothing but aching limbs and chills to show for it. And if he’s not careful, she’ll be the reason his empire crashes down around him before he’s had the chance to cement it.

The root of the decay must be removed.

Anger takes hold and his nails grip into the leather binds. He hates that she’s the reason he’s still alive. That her body’s kept him warm, that her lilting voice lures him into security whenever he starts to doubt. He’s become too reliant. Too naive. _Too blind_ to her Mudblood ways _._

The book flicks open at his command. Swirling black letters and sigils greet him in the light of his wand. He reads, determination building. Scribed by a God or not, he’ll master what he has to. No matter what lies she’s fed him, there’s only one certainty in Tom’s mind.

She has to die.

**Isn't that the way?**

**Everybody's got their dues in life to pay**

  _\---- Albania, 1 week ago_

The spells missed her by inches. Swearing hard beneath her breath, Myrtle looked up as the wall above her cracked, the stones scuffed from impact falling into her hair. Someone fired another wind shot.

“Bugger!” It was a close one. She shook the rubble loose, spitting against the dust, and ran to the next cover, rock cracking beneath her feet. Her leather boots were worn and didn’t keep the cold out half as well as they used to. When all this was over she’d ask Holt for a few tailoring spells, see if she couldn’t reinforce them before her next mission.

 _If_ there was a next mission.

Sure, in the daylight the Albanian mountains were probably beautiful to see: but in the middle of October, after seven consecutive days of rainstorm after rainstorm, the allure of the rocky and occasionally forest-y landscape lost its appeal. They were a death trap, suitable only to goats and whatever other wildlife could make sense of the dips and crevasses that took her footing every two seconds.

And, apparently, to the wizards who wanted her dead.

After a solid three minutes of zig-zagged running, Myrtle scurried beneath a large trunk at the edge of the forest. There hadn’t been a loosed shot in several minutes. Damp, harsh air stung her lungs as she gathered her breath. Freezing fog descended over the mountains close to dark and it had left her with a terrible chest. Probably something she inherited from her father’s lungs with his awful, seasonal bronchitis. She fished out the hip-flask from her pocket and took a swig. Thank Merlin for refilling enchantments or she’d have lost the feeling in her veins days ago.

Voices echoed closer and she swore. So much for a moment’s respite. With a shove Myrtle pushed herself to her feet and ran, wishing she hadn’t agreed to this trip in the first place. Cat and mouse games always ended in scratches. It was easy to lose sight of why she’d endured so long in such a desolate landscape, but the lure of it kept her focused.

 _When I find it,_ no-one _will ignore me._ Her name would no longer be followed with a snigger. Even Dumbledore would look upon her with more respect. He was a nice man - if not completely ridiculous. She wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d been in Slytherin, but then, the hat had wanted to sort _her_ into Slytherin too.

 _There’s a ruthless streak in you,_ the hat had said. But then she’d begged for somewhere different, since she’d noticed, even from just standing in line for ten minutes, that nobody seemed to _like_ the Slytherins, so she’d ended up in the sodding Ravenclaw house where if you couldn’t scalp the fine hairs off a tortoise in first year you weren’t worth anything.

Her head whipped as a blast skimmed her cheek. Startled out of her misery-ridden nostalgia, Myrtle threw herself out of the way and further down the bank. Mud coated her shoes. She blasted at the soil, trying to get her feet free from the sucking ground but it stuck fast. Another blast - another damn wizard on the hunt for what she knew. The foundations rocked beneath her and the world flipped, ground as sky, treetops as the ground, as Myrtle tumbled down the bank. A giant trunk stood fast to accept her body’s collision.

She stopped. As fast as she’d stumbled she floated instead, buttocks to the sky as her body levitated towards softer ground. Far away, further up the bank, the energy of magic stuck to the air. They were still coming. And Myrtle was levitating.

Her arms flailed against thin air as slowly, she was turned to see two bright, incredibly beautiful eyes staring back at her.

“Who the hell are you?” The man’s voice was rich, deep like chocolate. Myrtle put her hands on her hips.

“I’m running for my life. Who are _you_?”

Even upside down she could see his lip curl. “I’m…”

Shouts erupted. Sparks flew past his head. Myrtle found herself face down in grass as levitation left her, her limbs fending for themselves as she scrambled back to her feet. The wizard who’d saved her ducked low, eyes narrowed on her pursuers.

“You brought enemies here. _Why?”_

What an absolutely stupid question. Myrtle brushed down her coat. “Oh you know, fancied a thrill being chased by Albanian wizard monks in the forest.”

Why wasn’t he running? Myrtle went to flee but a magnet stayed her feet. She couldn’t exactly scarper, not when he’d saved her life. He might not know why he’d done it, and judging by the look of him he practically lived out here, but she had a debt.

He swore as the gaining wizards shot at them, spells ricocheting off the bank. His snarl was feral as he turned to her. “You’re ruining years of my life’s work!”

“So are _you_ !” How _dare_ he snap at her?! Couldn’t he see the amount of trouble closing in? Myrtle dropped down as the grumpy man spun and aimed his wand. Screams echoed behind them.  A satisfied smirk evaporated from his full ips as the man dropped down to his knees. A few seconds passed without retaliation, until the boulder above them was obliterated. There was no way they could continue down such a steep hill. The only way out was back over.

A rock next to her exploded. Myrtle shrieked. “You’re making it worse! I don’t need a hero, I need an exit!”

“I’m not _saving_ _you_ ,” the grump sneered. “I’m _killing_ _them!_ ”

“Works out the same. _Get me an exit!”_

Mr Grump’s emerald spells flourished a path over the bank. The second the other wizards cried and fell away, Myrtle leapt over the hills, zig-zagging her way through the firing range. Where they fell, more would come. She wasn’t even sure why they were attacking her in the first place, unless they had a particular grudge against archaeologists.

Myrtle had no time to turn, but the terrorized shriek told her Mr Grumps had done her another favour. He was at her side in an instant, rushing along as the path turned into a thicker patch of forest. The commotion died down. Two of them against a horde of monks had won, yet she didn’t want to stop - and she couldn’t keep going. Her feet hurt, her shoulder ached. Myrtle dropped to her knees a minute later, squelching in the damp moss.

At first Mr Grump carried on, pelting into the trees. _Good riddance._ She had enough trouble trying to keep herself alive, let alone a poster boy for Dark Clothing Corp. Myrtle sucked in ragged, desperate breaths as she stared at the ground. McGonagall had told her how to handle panic attacks at Hogwarts, but not how to handle being out of shape. A pair of muddy shoes settled in front of her vision.

"Are you dying?”

He wasn’t even out of _breath._ With as much strength as she could muster, she raised her head and shot him a glare, not at _all_ distracted by his sharp eyes. “Unfortunately for you, no.”

“Who are you?” he asked. It was the way he studied her that made Myrtle realise who he was; the slight head tilt, narrowing of his gaze, the set jaw. Black hair curled against the wind, and a poise so graceful it could be dangerous. She’d never been alone with a man so handsome.

He was absolutely, positively dangerous.

“Warren. And you are?”

If he recognised her name he didn’t show it. Instead he spoke his name softly against the breeze. “Riddle.”

Myrtle tensed, but forced herself to stand. She’d last heard that name whispered in the corridors of Hogwarts; sometimes like a prayer, others like a curse. Either way, she wasn’t sure what the Head Boy of Hogwarts would be doing out in such a remote area of the world, and nor did she care to find out. If he got in the way she’d never get her hands on the heirloom.

“Nice to meet you, Riddle. Thanks for killing the monks for me.” She shoved her wand back in her belt. “Safe travels and cheerio.”

 _Walk away, nice and slow._ Every step on the sodden ground wanted to take her back to him, but she forced herself forward. Rumours had started, as they often did, about Riddle’s exploits when he left school. He hadn’t been the same since he came back from the orphanage in fifth year, they’d said, and his bid to be a Professor fell short. Told not to come back, or to come back later, or that he was too handsome to be a Professor and would seduce all the students. So many sniggering girls had their own versions, but Myrtle never thought to come up with one of her own. Whatever she’d thought of, ‘traipsing through Albania’ wouldn’t have popped into her mind.

“You’ll never survive out there.”

Myrtle stopped to look behind her. Riddle had turned his head to follow her path. Myrtle shielded her face as leaves flew around them. “Those monks won’t leave you alone.”

 _For Merlin’s sake._ Myrtle dropped a hip and put a hand on it. “And you’re the expert on Albanian wizard monks are you?”

His lips quirked. “As much as anyone else. But we may be of assistance to each other.”

Interesting. Tom Riddle of Slytherin House and general schoolgirl’s fantasy was offering assistance. _Assistance._ And smiling. At her. Myrtle Warren of Ravenclaw who nobody ever even noticed.

Curiosity unfurled like a cat on her chest. “I can only help you if I know what you’re doing. We could be looking for something in completely different areas of the forest.”

Just like that, Riddle’s charm disappeared. “I’m looking for an artefact. Incredibly precious. I got waylaid on the border, and ended up out of sorts...”

“Out of sorts?”

His mood soured, lips turning into a sharp line. “Other people were also after the artefact.”

“What is it?”

Riddle ignored her, his glower intensifying. Myrtle had no time for games. “Well it must be _incredibly_ precious if it makes you an arsehole whenever you’re asked about it.”

“I’d been after it for years until you landed at my feet,” he said through gritted teeth. “Now I can add wasted minutes talking to you.”

It was in the way he said it: Years, months, all of his life’s work, and he implied it was all gone just because she’d turned up? She’d never known a woman could cause so much damage. If he carried on she’d get an inflated ego. “Well it’s all very well and good to be _after_ something, but you won’t do any good whipping out your wand and shooting anything that comes close.”

“What do _you_ know? _”_ He spat the words at her, shooting such an emotionless glare in her direction that Myrtle feared she’d whither under the gaze. “You’re a mudblood. Your opinion means nothing.”

A moment passed as the sting of his words settled into something else. Myrtle furrowed her brow at him. “And you’re a moody git. No wonder you’re on a solo expedition. I don’t know a gnat’s arse who’d want to travel with you.”

He remained still, a monolith against the wind, as Myrtle made her way up the pass. For once, the sliding moss and craggy rocks against her palms didn’t bother her. They were a distraction against the sinking feeling dropping ever lower in her stomach. This wasn’t going well. It wasn’t going well at _all._ If she returned empty-handed she’d never live it down, and this--- _buffoon_ was messing it all up! Talk about his life’s work, what about hers? What about the hours and minutes of working so hard to build a reputation all for him to turn it upside down?

There wasn’t even a soft footstep before a hand came to rest on her shoulder. Myrtle jumped. The angles of the man’s face were beautiful up close--like one of the Muggle sculptors had captured the image of a God and immortalised it as human.

“I could kill you in your sleep,” he said quietly. A statement, rather than a warning. Myrtle didn’t move. She’d heard the stories -- the amazing Slytherin student, disciplined self-educator, ambition rooted deeper than a thousand year old tree -- and understood now why Dumbledore had been wary of such a deep spark. But something about him took her off guard.

A charm that went beyond the doe-faced features and dark cunning. Something inside screamed at her to say no. To keep walking. But the vision of _kedvra_ being the last thing she heard as the spell hit her back stopped her from moving.

“I’ll be sure to dream of something nice, then.”

\-----

The sun had long descended below the horizon when they finally stopped walking. Myrtle managed to whine at him at every opportunity she saw for sitting down, but Riddle wouldn’t have it. He strode with purpose, long limbs taking him two paces away from her in a heartbeat. His chosen shelter was a cave -- or would that be a tunnel? -- chipped way beneath a risen hill of moss and mud. It was hidden enough for wandering eyes to glance past it, and the moment they entered the cave Riddle snapped off the light from his wand in favour of lighting a fire.

“I don’t remember you from Hogwarts.”

His voice was barely audible over the crackling flames. Myrtle sat so close she may have been on top of them. “That doesn’t surprise me. Wizards like you only remember important people. Not only was I a Ravenclaw, I’m muggle-born, so there went any chance of you wanting to speak to me.”

Silence lingered before he asked, “You remember me?”

Myrtle paused, considering how best to answer. She couldn’t tell him about the times she’d wondered what the hell the other girls saw in him, or when she’d peered over her glasses to stare at a fuzzy outline of his bum to see what the fuss was about. “I remember the effect you had. Most of the girls in my year were in love with you. After Olive died, I tended to bury my head in books. Tried to make sure the same thing wouldn’t happen to me, whatever it was. Avoided that bathroom like the plague, got my exams over with and… here I am.”

She might have been mistaken, but a shadow passed behind Riddle’s eyes at the mention of Olive’s death. It rushed through her in seconds; the memory of the stretcher, and the bathroom, of _Hagrid._ She was so glad Dumbledore intervened when he did, but what would have happened if the big lug had been sentenced? If she hadn’t been witness to Hagrid’s innocence, and if Dippett hadn’t believed her…

Well, she wouldn’t be here, miles from anywhere, isolated with the Slytherin King.

Riddle turned that ice-cold gaze on her. “What exactly _are_ you doing here?”

Myrtle froze. He might have just read her mind, or it could have been a happy coincidence. Gathering her strength to push behind nonchalance, she shrugged. “Told you. Looking for something.”

“What is it?”

“When I asked _you_ nicely about it you shot me down quicker than a sparrow with a slingshot so I shall do the same.”

Riddle conceded with a jaw clench. Myrtle’s heart beat quicker in the silence. She could play pretend all she liked: snap at him, banter with him, call him names. But she’d studied humans and animals long enough to know that in both species, Riddle was a hunter. He exuded charm. Grace. A glorious dance of manipulation to hide the darkness within. He’d been honest with her, open as a Muggle’s church door. He could kill her. Easily. And she knew that he was only keeping her here, alive and warm, because he needed her for something. Sure, he gave the illusion of freedom, but Riddle wasn’t the type to keep loose ends.

The question wasn’t whether he would kill her. The question was _when_.

**Sing with me, sing for the year**

**Sing for the laughter, sing for the tear**

**Sing with me if it's just for today**

**Maybe tomorrow the good Lord will take you away**

Another night, another dream, the same ache that filled her insides: it was like a movie, only grey and maudlin, a screen folded over the memory. Myrtle stood at the top of Hogwarts’ main staircase, transfixed on the body carried down to the entrance hall. They’d covered it with a white sheet—as if that would protect the students from the knowledge a dead girl lay beneath it—and shuffled carefully along. A few stray students wept into each other’s uniforms. Myrtle couldn’t find it in herself to cry. She pushed her glasses up her nose as Headmaster Dippett greeted the gloomy procession at the main doors. One of the Slytherin boys stiffened his back as the headmaster and Dumbledore shared a word. As soon as the stretcher was out of sight, she sighed, smoothed down her tie, and turned back to the dormitory with a numbness in her chest.

_It could have been me._

She’d never say Olive Hornby deserved to die. But it was a stroke of fortune that the relentless tease had rushed into Myrtle’s preferred bathroom after Perkins snapped her bra, only to never come out again. Every step back to Ravenclaw Tower thudded through Myrtle’s bones.

_Could have. Might have. What if._

Even the creak of the dormitory portrait swinging open sounded melancholy. Instead of the normal chatter, a dull silence welcomed her. Most days she’d have preferred it--anything to stop the others from pulling her pigtails or laughing at how frizzy her hair was or mocking her glasses--but it didn’t sit right. Something was _missing_.

An hour before, Olive Hornby had sneered and asked why Myrtle needed such big glasses when she had such tiny eyes.

Then Olive Hornby lay cold and dead on a stretcher.

“What did you dream of?”

Morning light appeared an hour after Myrtle woke to light a fire. There wasn’t any skill in it, not like her father used to do with flint and dry wood. She just swirled her wand and the flames appeared. Riddle watched her from his place by the wall. He hadn’t even moved to let her know he was awake.

“School,” she said.

He said nothing more, either because it was boring or because he already knew. He unfurled himself like a snake from its coil, long limbs stretching out for him to stand. Myrtle couldn’t quite shake the feeling he’d been in her head the night before. Who was the say he wouldn’t do it again?

“Where I need to go,” Riddle said, covering the noise of Myrtle’s grumbling stomach, “Is over a hundred miles from here. It’s hidden in the rock face, and like the rest of this expanse of nothing, it--”

“--is warded against all forms of magically-induced transportation including flying, apparating, and portkey.” Myrtle arched a brow. “Sounds like we’re heading to the same place.”

For a long moment Riddle watched her, the edges of a smile playing on his lips. He held a hand out, smooth skin dewy in the morning light. “Then we’d better get going.”

\-------

“Oh the grand old Duke of York,

He had ten thousand men,

He marched them up to the top of the hill,

And he marched them down again.”

Myrtle hummed to herself as she navigated the rocks. Considering it was their third miserable day aimlessly traipsing together, there was an extra spring in her step. Maybe it was because she liked the company. Or that the company hadn’t killed her. Either way, she found she enjoyed the annoyed little grunt that escaped Riddle’s mouth every so often.

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh the Grand ol’….”

“Warren.” Riddle snapped her name like a spell. “Next time you want to get rid of wizard monks, sing to them.”

Myrtle stuck out her tongue, and started a new refrain as she passed his looming form.

“Oh the grumpy Slyth-er-in,

His wand was up his bum,

He walked until it sparked his pubes,

Then ran back to his mum,

OHHHHHH the gru….”

A vice-like grip wrapped around her wrist. Myrtle gasped into the palm that covered her mouth, muffling her shriek. Riddle’s chest, damp but warm, pressed against her back. Myrtle grasped at his fingers but he shook her loose.

“ _Sssh!_ ” His low hiss trickled into her ear like a rattlesnake. “We have company.”

Ignoring the tingles sinking under her skin. Myrtle stopped her struggle. Distant shouts echoed across the mountains. More wizard monks? She hadn’t spotted any since she’d met Riddle, either a coincidence or happy accident. Myrtle swore beneath her breath, trying to ignore the shooting pain of her wrist bones.

“They sent more.”

“They sent _a few_.” Still, Riddle paused as he came to crouch next to her, surveying them carefully. Whatever threat they posed, he wasn’t smiting them which was either a good sign or he’d be throwing her in front of them to get away himself. “There.”

Myrtle followed his line of sight. Up along a thin ridge, where some haphazard trees dangled from the roots towards the ground meters below, the dark edge of a doorway gloomed out at them uninvitingly. It practically screamed ‘death lives here’. Myrtle shot Riddle a look.

“You’re not serious.”

“You’d rather go through the monks?”

 _Damnit_. Precipice of death or fanatics with wands--she wasn’t sure which would be worse. Once the monks turned their backs, Myrtle cut a sharp path to the right. Riddle followed, not even a sound escaping him. Myrtle’s breaths ached through her chest, every inhale a wheeze. Bronchitis had definitely taken hold. As her boots followed the thin trail between ridges and rocks, trying to stop herself choking on the stale air, everything suddenly seemed so…. Stupid. When she’d first seen the pictures of the lost treasure all those years ago at Hogwarts, she’d never dreamed she’d be trailed by Albanians wanting to skin her alive. The mere prospect of being helped by Tom Riddle of all people would never have jumped into her mind.

Yet here she was, with a man who, for all his mystery and acid tongued-charm, was just as excited about finding ancient artefacts as she was. Anticipation rippled from him, either at the prospect of a fight or for the treasures they’d uncover in matter of days. Hours, if they stayed alive.

The second her hands grabbed the sides of the opening, Myrtle stumbled into the alcove with an exhausted breath. The moan on the end of it echoed down the tunnel, black as Hogwarts’ robes. Braced on her knees, Riddle’s hand came to rest against the small of her back. Relics, runes and symbols covered the chamber below. Light poured in from the sky outside the thick mountain walls, illuminating a archaeologist’s wet dream. Its deathly presence settled on her as she slid down the side of the worn steps.

In the center of the golden masks, piled books and ritual altars, stood a monolith almost as high at the cavern itself. Myrtle inched towards it, watching as the light turned the stone from black to red.

“It’s the temple of Djall.” She’d read about it in her research. Not many followers of the death god remained. Probably even less now, if those wizard monks had been any indication. There wasn’t a single piece of evidence wizards even followed Djall in the first place, but they’d probably thought she was after this temple. “Why would they have a death god’s shrine here?”

Riddle didn’t hear her. His eyes burned black as he ghosted his hand over a statue, as though the ancient people had carved it specifically for him. Whenever he looked like that, whenever he exuded power and focus, it was as though a mirror had been put up to her face. Not as beautiful, and not as cold, and nowhere near as magnetic -- but a mirror all the same.

“We need to keep moving or they’ll be here before we know it.”

The words hurt more than she’d thought they would. This was an amazing discovery - the discovery of a _century_ even, yet they couldn’t stay a moment longer. Vines trailed down from vast windows overhead, a mountain turned into a church. It must have taken them years, even with magic, to carve such intricate designs. How she longed to study them, to discover the riches those followers held so dearly. To understand how they worked with Djall’s magic. Her fingers fell over a latch. The wooden door didn’t even creak as it swung open, a small patch of light illuminating the tunnel beyond. Part of her didn’t want to go. The sooner they carried on, the sooner she’d find what she was looking for. And the more they wandered, the more Myrtle realised -- Tom Riddle was after the same thing. And when they found it, he wouldn’t need her any more.

A clang echoed around the chamber. Riddle threw his pack over his shoulder, eyes narrowed anywhere but her. He gestured at the open door.

“What are you waiting for?”

Pressing her lips together, Myrtle stepped through the archway and into the mountains beyond. A mist had descended during their time in the temple: it covered the trees, casting the entire landscape in a grey smog. Myrtle forced her feet onwards. As he overtook her, Riddle’s pack looked heavier. Myrtle tried to glimpse beneath it but he was too fast, rushing over the boundaries two paces ahead of her.

“Merlin, slow down.”

All hells to the person who decided to ward against apparating. Myrtle shuddered against the freezing mist that soaked through to her skin. Short of incinerating the entire forest, the wood was far too damp to start a fire and her wand’s heat only went so far to stop the cold tingling in her fingers. All the trees looked the same. A big rock which told her they’d passed another mile turned into another big rock twenty minutes later, and eventually Myrtle gave up trying to keep track. Riddle strode ahead, seemingly unphased, for a couple of hours until he stopped to survey the land.

“We’re close. I feel it.” Riddle’s triumphant smile fell to ash. “You look blue.”

Myrtle blinked. “I’m fine.”

“No.” Riddle was at her side in an instant, clammy hand on her forehead. A tingle ran through her at his touch, and she jerked back. The frown on his face looked positively offended. “I was checking your temperature.”

“Check your own!” Myrtle pushed past him, bumping against his shoulder. Her breath hitched. The world tipped upside down, gray clouds as the ground, as the grass met her body with a thud.

**Half my life's in books, written pages**

**Live and learn from fools and from sages**

**You know it's true**

**All the things come back to you**

He should have left her there.

By the time he’d taken twenty paces from Warren’s crumpled form, Tom stopped. It was as though a barrier prevented him going any further, a block against his typical callousness. He’d never cared before--a happy side effect of the numb ache inside of him. And he’d most certainly never let a mudblood sway whatever feelings he had towards benefiting them. But as he studied Warren’s still body, damp and graceful on the forest floor, Tom found himself walking back towards her.

“Get up.”

He could still get to where he needed without her. The monks were protecting the temple, they had no need for a stupid shack out in the middle of nowhere. Warren’s aim clearly hadn’t been an artefact of Djall (pity, as the God did seem to have some wizard friends with _very_ interesting theories on manipulating reality), so what did he need her for? She could die on this hellhole for all he cared.

He studied her pale form sprawled on the grass, her limp body reminiscent of...

Olive. She looked like Olive. After the Basilisk had come face to face with the weedy student, the exhilaration he might get caught, that he’d committed his first murder, that he’d _got away with it,_ threatened to spiral him out of control. He’d wrapped it up. Zipped it tight. Hagrid was an easy target to hang Olive’s death on, since the idiot insisted on bringing wretched creatures into the school, but he’d lived on that power since.

So why was he suddenly stricken by a woman almost half his size, a pain in his arse, fainting to the ground? Magic still worked in this expanse of nothing, even if apparating didn’t. With her body bobbing along behind him, Riddle walked with the soaked girl getting even wetter from the brief spell of rain. He made much faster time, though it passed achingly slower without her pestering him every two minutes.

By the time he found shelter, his own boots didn’t have a dry bit anywhere, his toes ached, his thighs hurt. Warren still hadn’t woken up, and something akin to worry planted in his stomach. The cabin he found wasn’t the one he _needed_ \-- the one he suspected Warren was after too -- but it was a roof over their heads. A fireplace. A rug on the floor, where he gently placed the woman’s still form.

Tom stoked a fire. Boiled water. Threw a blanket on her, careful not to smother her. He was wasting valuable minutes yet he couldn’t walk away. He sat on the cold wooden stool, staring into the fire, wondering how long it would take for him to build up the strength to move on. It was tiredness that made him stay, of course. Nothing akin to empathy for the outsider who loved stupidly dangerous adventures in remote places, all for the sake of objects.

“Oh the tetchy Rav-en-claw…” _Why,_ why was he doing this? He’d never sung in his life, not even at the orphanage where they made them recite god-awful nursery rhymes. Tom cleared his throat and tried again.

“...the tetchy Ravenclaw,

Her voice was paper thin,

Her singing made the monks’ ears bleed,

And that is how we win…”

Slowly, Warren’s eyes opened. It took her a few moments, and when they finally focused on him, Tom rewarded her with a tiny smile.

“Thought that might get your attention.”

“Your singing is atrocious.”

“Says the woman whose tone could strip wallpaper.”

She sat slowly, breaths sickly. For a moment her blue eyes went wide, and then she furrowed her brow. “This isn’t the cabin with the…”

Tom blew steam from the mug of hot water in his hands. “No. A temporary stop.”

“Thought not.” Warren said it so surely, Tom asked her a question by frowning. She saw it, and rolled her eyes. “There’s a fence -- a wall, really, before you get to the cabin. Full of hexes, wardings… not sure who put it there but they were clever. Rumour has it they might even still be on the other side. If it’s Chief Wizard Monk we’re fucked.”

Tom barked out a laugh and sprayed water on his fingers. He wiped them off on his trousers. “I believe the time for formality has long passed, don’t you agree, Warren?”

“If formality is _indeed_ passing, call me Myrtle.” She shot him a smile, and Tom found he couldn’t look away. Myrtle Warren, the weedy little thing with glasses as big as her face. It was a vision he had of her, a frame of her features, the same as he did everyone he’d come across on his struggle to power.

And there was a long way to go yet. “Myrtle. We both want what’s on the other side of that wall. Buried in the cabin, or its grounds, or in some demi-god’s chest, we both appear to be determined to get it. So why don’t we work on that together?”

Rose pink came back into her cheeks. Myrtle considered him a long moment. “If your ego can afford to let you work with someone else, then I don’t see any reason we shouldn’t.” At his scoff, Myrtle came to rest on her knees, half by the fire, half turned towards him. “It takes one lone ranger to recognise another. This isn’t a field trip you decided to take a random, but I reckon you’ve long imagined yourself as the hero of this journey.”

Her astuteness caused him to pause. “Wouldn’t _you_ want to be a hero?”

“Heroes are for make believe,” said Myrtle. “I’d rather just get the job done.”

“And what’s your job?”

“Right now? To beat whoever’s on the other side of the wall.” She said it so matter-of-fact that her hair, damp and loose around her shoulders, seemed at odds with the rest of her. He remembered the strange Ravenclaw whose voice squeaked like a hamster. She’d been two years behind him, yet as he thought back to the last time he’d seen her something sparked at the back of his mind.

His final year. Potions. He’d attended Slughorn’s lesson at the Professor’s request to turn pages and assist demonstrations. Slughorn had reasoned if Tom learned about teaching, his desire to become Professor of the Dark Arts might take root and flourish.

But during the mind-numbing, achingly slow fifth-year lesson, the little Mudblood answered every single question Professor Slughorn asked under her breath, then frowned whenever someone answered incorrectly. Her quill scratched the parchment as she took copious notes. There were even diagrams for things Slughorn hadn’t mentioned at all.

Tom ignored her after a while, and left the lesson early. He had bigger things to attend to, after all. His time at school was a constant motion, on to the next slice of knowledge, the next conquered textbook. But if the inkling that prickled at the back of his mind was correct - and his inklings most often were - he’d underestimated this mudblood at his peril.

Tom studied her a long moment. “What do you want to do after your mission?”

The woman turned her eyes on him, beady and bright. In her small, dainty voice she said, “That depends.”

“On what?”

“On whatever’s on the other side of the wall.” She shot him a grin, which Tom realised he returned too late for him to disguise it as a grimace. He bundled the coat around himself. It smelled of moss and damp, soaked through to his skin, and he found he was quite worried that Myrtle would smell it too.

“You haven’t had many people believe in you, have you?” Her question caught him off guard. Tom blinked instead of replying, and Myrtle took it to continue. “You put on a front but I can see it. You impress people, you’re praised for your academic achievement, but nobody sees you.” Myrtle nodded to herself. “I was nothing, but I know I can be something. I know I can prove everyone who ever doubted me, whoever passed me off as a stupid no-one, as _someone._ ”

And she didn't care who she had to hurt to get it. Tom saw it now; the drive that took her through Albanian forests, through Albanian monks she didn’t care about him killing. Of meeting with old students who could easily kill _her._ She hadn’t even flinched at his words, just took it as truth. Myrtle Warren was a woman scorned, and even more than that -- a woman with a dream.

“You’re dangerous, Myrtle.”

“In more ways than you know.” Myrtle said. Her wide, blue eyes shone like rippling water rested within them. She came to rest her hands on his knees, gazing up at him. “I see you, because I _am_ you.”

Yes, he knew that. That was why he hadn’t been able to leave, why he couldn’t see her waste away. He’d always believed the woman who didn’t fear him was to be feared herself, yet Tom reached down to Myrtle’s chin, tilted it upwards, and bent to meet her lips.

\----

Tom woke up to pelting rain on the cabin’s thin roof. The space by his side was empty, the slender curve where a woman had laid sleeping still warm at his touch. He rubbed his eyes, searching for a sign of her.

Her clothes were gone. Picked up from the chair where they’d been thrown the night before. Her pack. _His_ pack. Tom burst out of bed, naked to the elements. He cursed beneath his breath as he pulled on his shirt, his shoes, still damp and claggy but his _heart…_ oh there was a fire in there Myrtle didn’t want to meet.

The cabin took him fifteen minutes to find in the deluge; just a few more paces the previous night and he could have snatched it himself, left Myrtle before she found her way to wrap her thighs around his body and keep him there, thinking only of her.

Well, his mind was _very_ clear now.

The cabin’s door stood open. Rustling came from inside, barely audible over the storm. A clank. A string of swears. Tom inched his way through the gap in the front door, wand raised. Nobody had doubted his skills at Hogwarts -- he’d always known how to land the first strike at duelling. He spotted her reflection in a dusty mirror before he saw her actual form: Myrtle bent double over the floorboards, scrabbling to get them up.

Tom extended his wand, slowly.

The hinges creaked. Myrtle whipped up her head, caught sight of his reflection. She hurtled out of the way as his first strike splintered the wood into hundreds of shards. He followed her, spell after spell snapping at her heels. Tom would never be as careless as those who’d chased her on the plains -- he was ruthless. Efficient. As she rolled for the door he destroyed it. As she doubled back, he cast a heavy beam to block her path. Myrtle ducked behind the fireplace, breaths heaving.

“Come out, Myrtle,” he commanded.

Myrtle’s laugh echoed. “Can’t stand being beaten, can you?”

“Come out and I will let you live.”

“Bullshit!” White fire shot towards him, but Tom countered it with his own, green flame. A grandfather clock caught the blow, and shattered into pieces. “Temper, Riddle, temper. You’ll never find it with that attitude.”

“You know you can't win.”

“You underestimated me. You know you did. Even now you think I’m some waif mudblood your loins betray you by wanting.”

Tom stalled, wand gripped tightly to his chest. “Just come out, Myrtle...”

“I know you killed Olive,” she spat. Tom’s blood ran colder than the weather outside. Myrtle continued into his shocked silence. “I know you tried to blame it on Rubeus Hagrid, Tom. I know you charmed Helena Ravenclaw when you came to ask for a job.”

When clarity struck, it wasn’t with force - a quiet fell over him, draining him of his drive. He didn’t hear Myrtle move, not even a breath from her direction as he stepped out to the middle of the room.

“You. It was you. You convinced Dippett of Hagrid’s innocence. They closed the school….” Myrtle got him sent back to the orphanage for five long, disgusting months until they let Hogwarts re-open. She cut him off from progress, from the basilisk, from the things he coveted as his. He’d almost got caught in that fucking Riddle family house because of _her_ meddling, _her_ delays _._ Dumbledore followed him around like a guard attached to the hip because of _Myrtle Fucking Warren._

The basilisk had killed the wrong girl. Myrtle Warren was the reason he was so far behind, monitored by the ministry, _everything!_

The scream started in his belly and worked its way up, slowly through his throat until he unleashed it from his mouth. Myrtle didn’t even scream as the fireplace exploded.

“Riddle, stop!”

She _wouldn’t. Keep. Still._ Every swipe of his wand, green illuminating the corners of the cabin, she’d dart out of the way. Boxes overturned. Stones fell to the ground. She threw everything in her path to deflect the spells he cast, until he focused on just the one.

_“Avada…”_

“WAIT!” Myrtle’s scream pierced his ears. “You don’t kill blindly. I know you -- You want to matter, be a hero for the people you love.”

“Oh, but you were right Warren.” Numbness spread from his bones, through his veins, in to his heart. His voice didn’t sound like him, detached from his body like a stranger. Maybe this was how the creation happened -- anticipation of a kill mattered just as much as the act itself. “Heroes _are_ for make believe. It’s Conquerors who make history.” He aimed his wand at the door she hid behind, steady and sure as the darkness coiling around his heart. “And I love no-one.”

The door burst. With a gasp and flicker of silver light, Myrtle whipped up her wand. Silver and sapphire flashed around her head like a beautiful crown as Myrtle disappeared from sight.

_The diadem._

“NO!”

Tom’s scream reverberated around the empty cabin and silence answered him. No Myrtle. No diadem. Every dream he’d had, every day he’d spent searching for that piece of history, the only thing worthy of storing that sacred part of him.

Gone.

**Yeah, I know nobody knows**

**Where it comes and where it goes**

**I know it's everybody's sin**

The flash blinds him.

For a minute, maybe two, his eyes sting with the weight of magic. He doesn’t know if he’s dead. Every time he opens his eyes to see his surroundings the edges of his vision flickers.

It’s doubtful the dead feel ill, though. When he’s ready to stand he finally raises his head to the window ahead of him. It’s dark out; the sun’s just dipped low and stars sprinkle the growing black with flecks of white. There’s no Canis Major. No Pegasus. Nothing of the Albanian sky.

He laughs, joyous, and presses a hand against his chest.

_I am Tom Marvolo Riddle._

Good, he remembers his name. And he can walk, and see, and he’s definitely not where he was before.

But _when_ is he?

The answer comes with the startling laughter of children. Tom reels, darting back behind a statue of Merlin as students dressed in stupid-looking robes skip and stumble their way through the corridor. First year Slytherins. There’s an incredibly young Lestrange, tie askew. Tom’s fifth year. The day a first year Lestrange had his first run-in with a muggle born and bleated about it to Riddle for praise.

The day Olive Hornby came face to face with the basilisk.

Only this time, Olive doesn’t know how lucky she’ll be. It’ll be worth the sacrifice of this book--he’ll never find it again if it all goes to plan. The sacred texts are not nearly worth as much as what he needs to do, what he _must_ do, if he’s to ascend to his rightful place in the world. To live in the glory of his birthright as Salazar’s heir.

A fitting ending to this version of Tom Riddle, so that the other Tom - the fourteen year old already making his mark on the entire school -- can lay the foundations of his legacy. He’ll continue down the same road without interferences, without _Myrtle Warren_ wising up to her intellect and thwarting him with that forsaken Diadem.

Tom waits, a shadow becoming deeper, as he finally recognises the tipping point. The boy who offends Olive to the point of tears shed in the basilisk’s bathroom is diverted by the smell of something chocolatey on his way. As soon as he passes the statue of Merlin he somehow forgets where he was going, standing in the hallway with an odd look on his face. Olive Hornby walks on by, swinging her arms and humming a merry refrain. For a startling moment, Tom thinks it’s _their song…_ but dismisses it quickly. The memory of Myrtle’s warm lips, soft skin… it’s not enough to stop him doing this. She’s not worth the pain of losing what he’s worked so hard to build.

He idles his way to a spot near the bathrooms. He can’t bring himself to look as, ten minutes later, Myrtle rushes in to the bathroom, glasses fogged on her round cheeks. The other him - the young him - follows her in shortly after. A mudblood is a mudblood to Tom Marvolo Riddle. But to the older Tom, the scorned Tom, this means so much more than blood.

He knows when it’s done. Myrtle’s voice - that wisp of a thing - shrieks just one word. “Go--!” It’s cut short. There is nothing else to do. Tom closes his eyes against the inevitable, but can’t bring himself to smile.

As fifteen-year-old Tom Riddle escapes the girls’ bathroom with a confident stride, his soul cracked for the first time, the man he would have been in a different life descends into nothing but shadow

**You got to lose to know**

**How to win**


End file.
